Sunday, 23 August 2015

Zone Mortalis - Kill Team - The Big LIttle Game Two

Following the success of our fist massed kill team game at the club Dave G. and myself decided to run a second big little game, this time based on some space hulk/zone mortal terrain I had built. A general invite was issued on the club's Facebook page and on the evening eight players plus Dave and myself took part. We had reduced the number of points available for each player and disallowed vehicles for this game.

Above: Generals make their plans.

We decided to pair up the eight players, Dave took on the role of the Space Hulk's Chaos Space Marine commander with some special rules to ensure that he could remain playing in the game despite his exposed position in the centre of the ship. I became DM, keeping track on turn order (dice off for each turn), giving arbitrary rule interpretations, but still ensuring that fun was had by all. I made sure that all knew this was not to be a competitive game.

Above: The table. Teleportation pad centre, Medi-lab to the left and Armoury above.

We set 4 objectives in the ship and two special rooms, the armoury, where any occupier could re-roll any shooting to hit dice rolls and the medi-lab where occupiers gained a 6+ feel no pain roll. Also in the ship was a teleportation device. This allowed Dave's dead Chaos Space Marines to potentially come back on to the board and visit other parts of the ship. At the beginning of his turn he rolled for each figure previously taken as a casualty on a roll of 2 to 6, the figure reappeared on a teleportation pad. On the roll of a one, the figure was lost forever never to return. Players scored more points for getting an objective off an enemy's board edge than their own.

Above: The armies arrive.

The sides were, Richard and Neil with Eldar, Alex and Daniel with Dark Angels, Callum and Dave R. with a strange alliegience of Space Marines and Nurgle Marines, and finally, Michael and Alex R. with Imperial Guard and 30K Space Marines! (Warp storm anomaly I guess?).

Above: Centurions, doing what they do best, being imposing.

With so many competitors taking part it was tricky to keep track enough to give a full account on all the twists and turns. A few of my memories were:

- The Imperial Guard seemed a little braver than their Space Marine allies and were able to grab an objective near games end, and although the Space Marine Warlord seemed invincible in any challenges, the plucky Imperial Guard figure with the objective eventually fell foul of the Nurgle Warlord.

- The Dark Angels made a strong play for the objective within the medi-lab but were ambushed by Eldar and Imperial Guard.

- The Nurgle Marines supported by the concentrated fire from Centurions managed to gain an objective and were able to destroy half of the Eldar side, but the remain Eldar, despite the loss of their Wraithguard, managed to get an objective off an enemy's board edge and win the game.

Again, all those involved enjoyed the game and took part in the right spirit, and were very interested in taking part in the next episode. The game really benefitted from Dave's brilliant, but not overpowering, use of the Chaos Space Marines.